However, these saws all seem intended for resawing dry lumber. And the tooth spacing seems too small to me at two or three teeth per inch. I'm more interested in ripping green logs and I think the tooth spacing should be bigger. Modern industrial bandsaw sawmill blades have an inch or more between teeth. Obviously you need to have at least three or four teeth in the wood.

Whats the most aggressive tooth spacing you've used for ripping green logs?

chancwj wrote:Whats the most aggressive tooth spacing you've used for ripping green logs?

I use 0.035" thick x 1-1/4" deep blades with 1" tooth spacing on my band sawmill. I wonder how that blade would work on a hand operated saw frame.

I have some old blades that I would give you if you wanted to try it. You pay shipping. Or depending on where you are located you likely could get some used blades from local band mill owners. I usually use the blades till they break from flexing around the wheels but there is normally good sections left that should last a long time in a frame where the blade is not flexed. The blades are 158" long.

Frame used for ripping are called scie-saws and this is a medieval type tool used to rip logs to halve / quarter timbers and also to produce planks. They predate the pit or whip saw that came into use after the scie-saw generally from the 1600's onwards.

We sent one of our Oxfordshire Woodland Group fellows on a course to learn how to make one of these saws so that we could use this in our woodland saw pit.

These saws are useful in that they can be disassembled and flat packed for ease of transportation with the blade clamped between the long side struts.